Harvard or MIT faculty, students, and staff who wish to sign the petition
should email harvardmitdivest@yahoo.com with the following information: name,
email address, university affiliation, department or college (if applicable,)
and graduation year (if applicable, otherwise, status -- staff, etc.) Please
include the word "petition" in the subject line. If you are a professor,
please also include the word "faculty" in the subject line. Thanks!
We, the undersigned are appalled by the human rights abuses against Palestinians
at the hands of the Israeli government, the continual military occupation
and colonization of Palestinian territory by Israeli armed forces and settlers,
and the forcible eviction from and demolition of Palestinian homes, towns
and cities. We find the recent attacks on Israeli citizens unacceptable and
abhorrent. But these should not and do not negate the human rights of the
Palestinians.
As members of the MIT and Harvard University communities, we believe that
our universities ought to use their influence - political and financial -
to encourage the United States government and the government of Israel to
respect the human rights of the Palestinians. We therefore call on the US
government to make military aid and arms sales to Israel conditional on immediate
initiation and rapid progress in implementing the conditions listed below.
We also call on MIT and Harvard to divest from Israel, and from US companies
that sell arms to Israel, until these conditions are met:
Israel is in compliance with United Nations Resolution 242 which notes the
inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war, and which calls for
withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from occupied territories.
Israel is in compliance with the United Nations Committee Against Torture
2001 Report which recommends that Israel's use of legal torture be ended.
In compliance with the Fourth Geneva Convention ("The occupying power
shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into territories
it occupies"; Article 49, paragraph 6), Israel ceases building new settlements,
and vacates existing settlements, in the Occupied Territories.
Israel acknowledges in principle the applicability of United Nations Resolution
194 with respect to the rights of refugees, and accepts that refugees should
either be allowed to return to their former lands or else be compensated for
their losses, as agreed by the Palestinians and Israelis in bilateral negotiations.
As of September 24, 2002, 127 faculty members, 210 students, 80 staff members,
and 148 alumni from Harvard and MIT have signed the petition.
Faculty who have signed the petition so far (as of September 24, 2002):
MIT Faculty (56)Jinane Abounadi, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Arvind, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Robert Ballufi, Emeritus, Materials Science and Engineering
Robert Berwick, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Lera Boroditsky, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Sylvain Bromberger, Linguistics and Philosophy
Anders Skovsted Buch, Instructor, Mathematics
Noam Chomsky, Linguistics and Philosophy
Joshua Cohen, Political Science
Suzanne Corkin, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Michel DeGraff, Linguistics and Philosophy
Jack B. Dennis, Emeritus, Computer Science and Engineering
Arindam Dutta, Architecture
Bevin P. Engelward, Bioengineering
Michael Ernst, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Danny Fox, Linguistics and Philosophy
Ahmed Ghoniem, Mechanical Engineering
Ted Gibson, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Kate Gould, Writing and Humanistic Studies
Hugh Gusterson, Science, Technology, and Society.
Morris Halle, Linguistics and Philosophy
Sally Haslanger, Linguistics and Philosophy
Irene Heim, Linguistics and Philosophy
Diana Henderson, Literature
Berthold K.P. Horn, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Jean Jackson, Anthropology
Louis Kampf, Professor of Literature Emeritus
Nancy Kanwisher, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Mujid Kazimi, Nuclear Engineering
Evelyn Fox Keller, Science, Technology, and Society
Jonathon King, Biology
Utpal Lahiri, visiting faculty member, Linguistics and Philosophy
Robert W. Mann, Emeritus, Mechanical Engineering
Alec Marantz, Linguistics and Philosophy
Haynes Miller, Mathematics
Wayne O'Neil, Linguistics and Philosophy
Radhika Nagpal, Lecturer, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Jon Nissenbaum, Lecturer, Linguistics
Ruth Perry, Literature
David Pesetsky, Linguistics and Philosophy
Mary Potter, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Nasser Rabbat, Architecture
George Rathjens, Professor of Political Science, Emeritus
Balakrishnan Rajagopal, Urban Studies and Planning
Norvin Richards, Linguistics and Philosophy
Bish Sanyal, Urban Studies and Planning
Ted Selker, Media Lab
Susan Silbey, Sociology and Anthropology
Susan Slyomovics, Anthropology
Abha Sur, Lecturer, Urban Studies and Planning
Mriganka Sur, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Ken Wexler, Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Elizabeth A. Wood, History
John Wyatt, Electrical Engineering
Stephen Yablo, Linguistics and Philosophy
Kamal Youcef-Toumi, Mechanical Engineering
Harvard Faculty (71)
Robert S. Abernethy III, Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Abdul Abou-Samra, Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Bill Allan, Classics
Peter Ashton, Biology
John Assad, Harvard Medical School
Phineas Baxandall, Lecturer, Social Studies
Mark Baxter, Psychology
Jane Bestor, Lecturer, Social Studies
Richard Born, Harvard Medical School
Xandra Breakefield, Professor of Neurology, Molecular Neurogenetics Unit,MGH
Alfonso Caramazza, Psychology
Mary Carlson, Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health
Patrick Cavanagh, Psychology
Steven Caton, Anthropology
Courtney Cazden, Education, Emeritus
Nicholas A. Christakis, Harvard Medical School
John Duffy, Classics
Felton Earls, Harvard Medical School
William von Eggers Doering, Chemistry and Chemical Biology
Ayman El-Desouky, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Brad Epps, Romance Languages and Literatures
Mary C. Smith Fawzi, Instructor, Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Jeffrey Goldberg, Lecturer, Music, and Instructor, Graduate School of Education
William Granara, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Victor Gurewich, Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Virginie Greene, Romance Languages and Literatures
Paul D. Hanson, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Joseph Harris. English
Richard G. Heck, Jr., Professor of Philosophy
Paul F Hoffman, Earth and Planetary Sciences
Steve Holmes, Adjunct Instructor, Harvard Extention School
Robert Howe, Engineering and Applied Sciences
C.-T. James Huang, Linguistics, Harvard University
Ruth Hubbard, Emeritus, Cell and Molecular Biology
Christopher P. Jones, Classics and History
Martin Kilson, Emeritus, Government
Richard Levins, Harvard School of Public Health
J. Lorand Matory, Anthropology
Markus Meister, Molecular and Cellular Biology
George Moseley, School of Public Health
Salikoko S. Mufwene, Linguistics
Thomas Mullins, Associate Director, Center for Middle Eastern Studies
David Mumford, Emeritus, Mathematics
Gregory Nagy, Classics and Comparative Literature
Ken Nakayama, Psychology
Afsaneh Najmabadi, History and Women's studies
Laila Parsons, Middle Eastern Studies
Gloria Ferrari Pinne, Classics and History of Art and Architecture
Louise Popkin, Adjunct Instructor, Harvard Extension
Matthew Rosen, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Bernardo Sabatini, Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School
Christopher Shera, Otology and Laryngology, Harvard Medical School
Jessica Shubow, Lecturer, History and Literature
Susanna Siegel, Philosophy
Catherine Snow, Graduate School of Education
Abdulkarim Soroush, Visiting Professor, Islam Studies, Near Eastern Languages
and Civilizations
Elizabeth Spelke, Psychology
Christopher J. Sturr, Lecturer, Social Studies
Richard F. Thomas, Greek and Latin
Bert Vaux, Linguistics
Francois Vigier, Graduate School of Design
Cherie Wendelken, History of Art and Architecture
Kath Weston, Director of Studies and Senior Lecturer, Women's Studies
Kim Williams, Kennedy School of Government
Richard Wilson, Physics
Robert Wisnovsky, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
John Womack, History
Nur Yalman, Anthropology
Alan M. Zaslavsky, Harvard Medical School
Henri Zerner, History of Art and Architecture
Our Colleagues in Israel who Support the Petition
Emmanuel Farjoun, MIT PhD in Math, now professor at Hebrew University
Yosef Grodzinsky, MIT Postdoc in Linguistics, now profssor at Tel Aviv University
Idan Landau, MIT PhD in Linguistics, now lecturer at Ben Gurion University
Tanya Reinhart, MIT PhD in Linguistics, now professor at Tel-Aviv University
Nomi Shir, MIT PhD in Linguistics, now professor at Ben Gurion University